Lando Norris’s world championship bid suffered a blow when the British driver was disqualified from the Las Vegas Grand Prix.
Norris finished runner-up to Max Verstappen in Sin City, but he has lost his points after it was found that the skid blocks on his McLaren were less than the minimum depth allowed in the rules.
His teammate Oscar Piastri has also been disqualified with his fourth-placed finish chalked off.
Norris was expecting to head to the penultimate round in Qatar next weekend with a 42-point lead over Red Bull’s Verstappen with just 58 points left to play for. But the disqualification means both Verstappen and Piastri now trail Norris by 24 points.
The Etihad Airways Abu Dhabi GP then finishes off the season on December 7.
McLaren team principal Andrea Stella said the infraction stemmed from the cars bottoming out during the race at levels they did not do during practice — leading to excessive contact with the ground.
Stella said the damage to both cars was “accidental” and that “the FIA noted the breach was unintentional, there was no deliberate attempt to circumvent the regulations, and mitigating circumstances also existed.
“We apologize to Lando and Oscar for the loss of points today, at a critical time in their championship campaigns after two strong performances from them all weekend," Stella added.
"While this outcome is extremely disappointing, we remain fully focused on the last two races of the season.”
Earlier, Verstappen produced a masterful drive to win the race after pouncing on a slip by pole-sitter Norris on the first turn of the street circuit to grab the lead.
He then controlled the race thereafter to claim the 69th Grand Prix win of his career, finishing more than 20 seconds clear. Mercedes' George Russell was third.
After the drama of Friday's qualifying, when heavy rain made for a treacherous surface that Verstappen likened to driving on ice, Saturday's 50-lap race under the glittering lights of Las Vegas got under way in cool, dry conditions.
Norris, who had arrived in Vegas fresh from back-to-back wins in Mexico and Sao Paulo, attempted an aggressive move to block Verstappen right from the start.
The move backfired and Norris ran off the track and allowed Verstappen to grab first place. Norris dropped back to third after he was passed by Russell into second.
“I made the mistake into turn one,” Norris said before the bad news had arrived. “You know you've got to be punchy into turn one, but I was just a bit too punchy and that cost me.
“But second is still a good result, good points. It's not like I'm too disappointed. I went for it, I let Max have a win, let him go and have a nice race.
“I wanted to put on a show right, that's why we're here in Vegas. It was not my best performance. But when a guy wins by 20 seconds it's because he's done a good job out there.”
Verstappen said Red Bull's tyre strategy had laid the foundation for the win.
“Normally the race is always a tough one for us, we are not normally that great on tyres, but today it seemed like we were more in control and I could push a little bit more,” he said.
“We had a lot more pace and I could stay out a little bit longer and split the race in half and that definitely helped a lot.
“The car was working pretty well, much more to my liking and at the end it was quite a decent lap. Every lap I was just feeling comfortable and not taking too much out of the tyre.”
Piastri had been desperately looking to make up ground in Vegas after surrendering a 34-point advantage in the drivers championship since his victory at the Dutch Grand Prix in August.
But the 24-year-old from Melbourne acknowledged that his hopes of catching Norris had taken a blow after Saturday's race.
Asked if he was confident of cutting into Norris's lead in Qatar, Piastri replied: “Hopefully. But I obviously need more than that now. It would be nice to get some good results to finish the year, but the championship picture is what it is.”
Lewis Hamilton can't wait for season to end
A downcast Lewis Hamilton has told the BBC he is not looking forward to 2026 after finishing 10th in the Las Vegas Grand Prix. Hamilton started at the back after qualifying in last place and is yet to finish on the podium for Ferrari, whom he joined to much fanfare this season.
The seven-time champion described his first year with Ferrari as “a nightmare” after he retired from the Sao Paulo Grand Prix two weeks ago.
“It's a terrible result. There is nothing positive to take from today,” Hamilton said. “I'm eager for it to end, I'm looking forward to it ending. I'm not looking forward to the next one.”
